Generation Gap
by zarabithia
Summary: Dealing with children is a lot more complicated than dealing with supervillains ever was. At least Dick thinks so.


Title: Generation Gap  
Rating: PG-13  
Disclaimer: Do covet. Don't own.  
Characters: Dick/Kory  
Setting: Mix of comicverse and toonverse. Future Fic.  
Summary: Some Father's Day in the future, Dick's time as a model resurfaces as karma to bite him in the derriere.

For eighteen consecutive Father's Days in a row, Dick had considered himself a very lucky man. He and Kory had been blessed with not just one, but two, beautiful, intelligent, independent daughters who loved their parents nearly as much as their parents loved them. Mari and Haley were Dick's chance to be the type of father his own would have been if that fateful day at the circus had never happened.

And thanks to their various aunts and uncles, both of Dick's kids were more than capable of kicking butt. What else could a father ask for?

But on the nineteenth time Dick celebrated the holiday, all of the usual pride and joy he'd felt through the years was absent - thanks to one phone call.

"I don't see why you're so upset about this," his oldest sighed into the phone.

"Mari'ander," he said, as calmly as he could manage through gritted teeth, "You called me - on Father's Day - to let me know that you're doing a spread in Playboy. My little girl is posing in a porn publication. How can you expect me to act any differently?"

Mari grumbled something in her mother's language. "I'm not a little girl anymore, Dad. If I were, Playboy wouldn't want me."

Oh, yes they would, the perverts! "You can't do it."

"What do you mean, 'I can't'?"

"I forbid it." Dick knew this was the wrong thing to say the minute the words left his mouth.

"You can't forbid it! In case you didn't hear me the first time, I'm an adult!"

Dick paused long enough to take a deep breath. Mari had inherited her mother's temper and that stubbornness - well, Dick knew where it had come from too, and it hadn't been from Kory. "Mari, I don't think you've thought this through. Do you know how many people buy that magazine? Do you know . . .oh, hell, do you know why they buy it?"

"To jerk off to?"

"Mari!"

"Well, it's true."

"And you're okay with men objectifying you like that?"

He can hear his daughter roll her eyes. "It's not objectifying if I put myself out there, Dad."

"Yes, it is!" Logic has failed him. But then, logic has never worked well with any of the women in his family.

"Mom doesn't think so."

Oh, hell. Of course Kory didn't think so. Kory didn't understand the concept of objectification at all. When Kory got home, she'd probably remind Dick that they didn't have objectification - or pornography - on Tameran. Maybe she would understand if he compared what Mari was doing to the time Blackfire had sold Kory into slavery. Slavery and porn? They were similar enough. But - wait - "Your mother knew about this? And she didn't tell me?"

"Of course not. We both knew you'd overreact just like this."

"I'm not overreacting!"

"You are." And now his oldest wasn't shouting anymore. Her voice had dropped down - and he'd made her cry. He was the very worst father ever. "You are overreacting, and . . . a-and I don't see why you can't be proud of me, like Mom is."

Because posing in Playboy wasn't anything to be proud of? "But-"

"You aren't. You-you're just judgmental. Mom even paid for me to go to the spa so I-I'd look nice and relaxed for the photo shoot."

"Mari-"

"But all you do is judge. I'm proud of my appearance, and I'm proud I'm going to be posing in Playboy, and I don't see why you can't be proud of me, too!"

"I am proud of you," he stated, because suddenly that was all that was important. "Please stop crying, sweetheart."

There was a sniffle on the other end of the line. "I have to go let Rex reapply my makeup. I love you, Dad, and Happy Father's Day."

Click.

Some Father's Day this was turning out to be. His wife was off on a deep space mission - which was probably a good thing for their marriage at present, since bringing up the slavery thing would probably result in a year on the couch - and he'd made his oldest child cry.

The worst part about the entire scenario was that Mari'ander was absolutely correct. She was a legal adult, and as such, there was nothing anyone could do to stop her from posing in Playboy if she wanted to. At least, that was the response that came from Clark, Kyle, Donna, and every Titan that he was able to reach by phone. Bruce's response was similar, with an added, "Look at their mother. What did you expect?", while Babs' response was simply to laugh.

Feeling completely useless, Dick did the only thing he could. He laid his head down on the kitchen table, closed his eyes, and mentally recited all of the possible ways he had failed his children as a father. Had he been too distant - more like Bruce than his father? Yes, that was probably it. He'd been unavailable, so now his little girl was seeking attention from millions of men that she hadn't gotten from her own father. It was psychologically sound, and it was all Dick's fault.

"Dad?"

He didn't have enough strength to hold his head up on it's own accord. Propping his head up on his hand, the pain in his lower back caused him to reflect that he was really getting too damn old to be fighting the Jokerz. Why couldn't that damn McGinnis kid be a little bit less useless? It's not like Terry had any kids trying to give him a heart attack yet, like Dick's so obviously were. Brat had no reason to be so damn incompetent.

Well, that wasn't fair, Dick supposed. It was really only Mari that was trying to give him a heart attack. For that reason, he flashed his best smile at his youngest, who was standing in the kitchen door way and looking at him with concern. "Hey. How's my Little Acrobat?"

"Well, if the shouting match was any indication, I'm doing better than you are," Haley announced as she sat down beside him.

"And just how much of that did you over hear?"

"Enough to know that you're having a pretty crappy Father's Day."

"Yep. Want to make it better?"

"Sure. Does it involve beating Terry McGinnis up?"

Aw. She sounded so happy about that. Mari had been this sweet once. "No. This is far more important."

"Okay," Haley agreed, hesitantly, because even at twelve years old, she understood the enormity of a promise more important to her father than kicking Terry McGinnis' ass.

"Promise me you'll become a nun."

Haley looked at him skeptically. It was the kind of skepticism that made Dick imagine that, in another seven years, this child too would be calling with news he didn't want to hear. Haley and Mari were too competitive for it to be the exact same news, so he'd never hear about Playboy from Haley. But teen pregnancies, prostitution, and the memory of Lian Harper's Vegas elopement to Conner Kent all danced in the back of Dick's list of possibilities.

All of which could be prevented with a chastity belt. Why didn't they make those anymore?

"Uh, Dad? I don't think I can become a nun."

"Please?"

"Um, but we're not Catholic," Haley reminded him.

"We could convert," Dick said hopefully. Actually, that sounded like a good idea. They still had time to send Haley away to a nice convent to finish her schooling, right?

"I don't think Mom will like that idea much."

Ah, no, Kory wouldn't. Even if she did, Dick didn't think the nuns would like Kory much. Dammit. Maybe the fact that their children were trying to give him a heart attack was actually Kory's fault.

"Besides, why are you so upset about Mari posing in a magazine? Weren't you a model once?"

Scratch that. It was no one's fault but his own that he was having the worst Father's Day ever.


End file.
